Travel app bookings up 16% as consumers embrace digital solutions

Bookings made via travel apps were up 16% in the second quarter of 2022, indicating a strong desire to travel and use digital tools among consumers.

According to a PYMNTS study titled How the World Does Digital: The Impact of Payments on Digital Transformation, which surveyed more than 15,000 consumers across 11 world economies, consumers reported more engagement with travel platforms such as Airbnb and Homestay along with other digital solutions in Q2 2022. 

While overall, digital transformation across all activities tracked in the study (such as paying for groceries or paying a doctor bill) increased 2.7% in the quarter, travel-related activities, including airfare purchases, hotels and rentals and local transportation, showed the biggest gains in Q2 2022 despite inflation and reports of airport chaos.

The activities where the digital transformation increased the most in the quarter included airline apps and websites (up 15.8% quarter-over-quarter), transportation apps and websites (up 15% quarter-over-quarter), home-sharing apps and websites (up 13.3% quarter-over-quarter) and bike and scooter apps and websites (up 11.9% quarter-over-quarter).

“That increase in digital transformation also prompted more consumers to use a variety of local transportation and mobility apps,” the study states, “where we noted a 15% increase in the use of apps to book and pay for train, bus and taxi rides and a 12% increase in the use of apps to book micromobility rides.”

The study also finds that consumers who use digital methods for one activity are more likely to use digital methods to transact in adjacent sectors such as travel.

For example, in the second quarter of 2022, 79% of consumers who placed grocery and restaurant orders online also used travel- and commute-related sites and apps.

Similarly, an Amadeus report from August of this year finds consumers consider travel their highest priority when it comes to discretionary spend.

Of 4,500 consumers surveyed from France, Germany, the United Kingdom, the United States and Singapore, international travel is highest on consumers’ spending list, with 42% of respondents ranking it their top priority in their coming year. 

Despite economic uncertainty, consumers, on average, estimate they will spend $2,670 on international travel over the next 12 months, in line with what they spent on average in 2019 ($2,780).

Three-quarters of respondents (75%) say they are more likely to choose a pay-by-installment option such as buy now pay later to fund travel over the coming year, compared to 44% who are more likely to use a credit card and 26% who are more likely to turn to payday loans.